Policy still in the pipeline for helping the homeless

In response to questions submitted by the NEWS to the City of Ekurhuleni (CoE), the city admitted to still not having a finalised vagrant policy or set of guidelines.

This comes after concerns were raised by Ward 18 Clr Heather Hart regarding recyclers and vagrants making use and living on the open piece of property next to the Sebenza Cemetery adjacent to Baker Road.

Hart’s concerns were raised in the December 16 edition of the NEWS and included uncontrolled access to the property, unregulated recycling, damage to the nearby wetland, and deterioration of nearby industrial areas.

“The site on Baker Road was recently visited by the social worker and chief social worker responsible for the area, with the expressed intent to conduct profiling of the alleged occupiers and vagrants on the site,” said acting CoE spokesperson Solly Mashabela.

He said on arrival most vagrants and recyclers had left the site.

Mashabela said profiling on site was not conducted due to:

• The size of the team which visited on December 3 and the fact that there had been no permanent structures erected at the time of the visit.
• Only two persons were found on the site during the December 7 visit who indicated that most of the other vagrants had left and it’s only two of them that remained.

In response to these concerns, Mashabela said due to legal concerns regarding the rights of the vagrants and recyclers the municipality needed to obtain an eviction order.

He said with Covid-19 regulations, evictions were halted. “There is also an aspect of providing alternative accommodation for the people being evicted,” said Mashabela.

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“The city does not have an alternative shelter for the homeless. ” Mashabela said during level five of the lockdown, the CoE, in partnership with Gauteng Department of Social Development, established temporary shelters in town halls to accommodate the homeless.

“A significant number of the people that were removed from the street self-discharged and went back to the street,” said Solly.

“The city could not keep them in the halls against their will.” Mashabela said the CoE is working in partnership with the Gauteng Department of Social Development to craft a policy.

The policy will be adopted by all municipalities in the province to guide and shape services for homeless people. Mashabela said the reason for the policy’s delay has caused the need to look at legislative and constitutional obligations.

“It requires a lot of processes to become legitimate council policy or guideline, such as public participation and involvement of residents, which is difficult to carry out amid the Covid-19 Risk-Adjusted Strategy.”

Mashabela said it’s important the policy doesn’t infringe on the rights of all affected, residents of the city, vagrants, recyclers, and any other stakeholder that might be affected by the policy or guideline.

“It will require the council to put aside resources to implement the guidelines policy, given the financial constraints, it is difficult to provide the required resources for the vagrants/homeless/recyclers.”

Residents can report incidents regarding vagrants and recyclers to their nearest customer care centres for by-law enforcement and an EMPD response.

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